Month: December 2011

Where am I? Caught in a proverbial editorial limbo. Three versions of a single dialogue, each with its own litle twist. And I want to keep all of them. The story has some white patches and I think I have them covered… until I turn and look at them.

Meanwhile, I’m trying to decide how to pursue my other career, the one that will sustain me until my writing can do that instead. Various people have advised me to find a quiet office job that would enable me to pursue my writing career in the afternoon. It makes sense… if you plan my life with your standards. A quiet office job would quietly and surely kill me as the harmless little lies killed my marriage. I’ve been sitting down and mostly writing for a month now. And, frankly, the thought of sitting still for a living is not that appealing at all.

While I was writing my thesis paper, pushing back tears of blood, I thought: as soon as I’m done with this, I’ll be in writer heaven. Naive? Perhaps but it kept me sane. Too much reality will drive anyone mad, neh?

Make no mistake, I’ll still write. Probably more than I did so far. And publish, something I haven’t done in English yet. But this won’t be the prime achievement of my life. What I want is to be out there, solving problems. Real problems. Important problems. Problems that most people chose to walk away from. Why? Because I can. And because I want to.

I’m not 28 yet. I dare say I feel 20 years old. One day I will be a full time writer… when I’m 80 or so. I have time to change my mind ten times over. Right now I’m content to keep writing as a fun hobby.

I just took a look at Terra Nova. Sort of 7th Heaven meets Eureka and Jurassic Park, with a slush of Minority Report (I kept expecting Tom Cruise to walk by). Plus there’s that Rambo guy, doing the exactly same job as in Avatar, only this time he’s the good guy.
A serious problem I’ve had with this show: every actor/actress except the Rambo guy is cute as a button, like they walked off the Disney Channel. So I guess only pretty people get to have another chance in life…

Of course, if you enjoy Terra Nova, feel free to do so. Myself, I prefer shows like Battlestar Galactica, Stargate Universe and Firefly. Yes, two shows got cancelled prematurely, the third one had that infamously bad ending. To each his own.

Human beings often make plans. We do it to find comfort from the terrible unknown that is the future. Plans make us feel safe, give us a sense of control over our lives. That is until the circumstances change and we are left dangling by rocks and roots because our nifty plans just got washed away in the metaphorical flood we had no way of predicting.

Ain’t life grand?

Our characters are (most times) also people. They should also form plans. Then, when they are feeling all cozy, you can change the circumstances of the world they live in, conjure up that flood in whatever form you like and shatter their plans. Nothing gives human beings more shock than re-acquainting ourselves with that one basic fact: we don’t know what the future brings. We can only suspect.

Plans for the future often include missions your character wants to fulfill to deal with a minor problem. The flood distracts said character, making him forget the old plans… but that minor problem she tried to solve is still there and, like all problems left unattended, it is growing. With our character’s attention averted by the effects of the flood, that small problem has time to grow into a large problem.